Hello in good morning you guys. How are you doing. We're good?
How are you? Absolutely fantastic here at the zoo and we're broadcasting right here
by this beautiful lake in South Carolina because we're celebrating turtles as well. Guys.
Right, we're actually at the Santa Barbara Zuit. Santa Barbara. Oh
my god, I love, Oh my god, you guys play it is
Oh god, you go down there. I believe it's Combello Avenue where all
the restaurants. You're right down there by the ocean and stuff. Yeah.
Yeah, Well, what we've been doing is we've been hanging out with turtles.
Better. Now, now, let's let's talk about the turtles of the
Santa Barbara area, because you know, so many of us associate them with
going out there into the ocean. But what are you up in the hills
and stuff. I mean, because I can't imagine how many turtles are around
that area. Well, right right now, one of the most endangered turtles
is the western pond turtle. And they've got some of them here and they're
going to Joy Zoo working on breathing the lease and endangered turtles up soon.
They're getting gearing up to do that. They also have some endangered audict turtles
who are not native to hear Yeah, they have the radiated tortoises. They
Douche Matt has actually been the matic gascar to meet those turtles in the wild.
There's some of the most endangered turtles in the world. So we think
of we think a turtles. A lot of people think of turtles and sea
turtles, but there's there's seven species and sea turtles, but there's actually over
three hundred and fifty turtles in the world and most of them are tortoises and
water turtles freshwater turtles. So it is a lot of turtle diversity out there
in our forest in South Charlotte and with Carolina, we have a lot of
traveling turtles. I mean, we look at we have box turtles, we
have snapper turtles, I mean, and I just love sitting with them,
do you know they love watching I mean sitting there with humans. They'll sit
there and it's like you're having this spiritual conversation with them. Yeah. A
turtle really has a really intent gaze. It really stares at you or whatever
it's doing, it's eating, you know, whatever it's focused on. That's
that's what it's that's what it's doing, that's what it's looking at. And
this world, you know, where our attention is often so twitchy and we're
looking at our phones and we're multitasking, it is so yelling and like you
said, spiritual to deal with a creature who is fully immersed the moment.
They experience time in a different way than we do, and that's one of
the reasons that your blood pressure will just drop ye when you're around the turtle
and you kind of sink into turtle time. I study Native American spirituality and
the one thing that they always teach us what the turtle is. It's a
reminder that we're going too fast and then that time it has to be self
reliant as well as less dependent, and that we should also increase sensitivity.
We should be aware of that that turtle brings such a powerful message to our
personal souls. Yeah, I think, aren't they powerful medicine. There's turtle
clans too in some of the first nations, and the wisdom that they bring
is a wisdom that stretches back to the time of the dinosaurs and the wisdom
of the elders. Because turtles are some of the longest lived creatures in the
world. They can they can live over two hundred years, and they remind
us that wisdom and age are great gifts and they're not something that should be
discarded. But too often they are in our culture. So often people like
to run away from the snake as well as the turtle. And the reason
being is because, you know, because if it's a snapper, stay away,
stay away. But I always look at them as being they are the
closest to Mother Earth. They feel the vibration of this planet guardians. They
are Earth guardians in a snapping turtle. People are afraid of them. But
stapping turtles are amazing animals and they're super important. Stapping turtles are like vultures
of ponds. You know, they eat, they eat dead things. They
don't hunt, they don't go after their animals. And you know, without
without snapping turtles, we'd we'd be up to our up to our neck and
dead fishing or your swomen. I yes, but they're they're super important,
and and they're only aggressive when you're bothering them or when they think you're bothering
them. You know, when you're one of our best friends is a forty
two pound, sixty five or so year old snapping turtle, him five Chief,
who's one of the turtles we highlight in our book. We have a
section on celebrity turtles because turtles are individuals like we are, and one of
them is we call him the Chief, the Chief, and we've known him
since twenty twenty and we did physical therapy with him after his accident and he
was hit by a car when he was crossing from his summer pond to his
winter pond. And he was rescued by these ladies to whom we apprenticed ourselves
of the Turtle Rescue League. They repaired his broken shell, his legs and
tail was paralyzed. But after working with him for two years, they built
him a wheelchair and we did physically got to work with them. He became
our good friend and he lets us pet him on that very gentle we can,
we can, we can feed him our hand in scotch him. And
he now has his own pond and he has regained use of his back legs
and he's called the Chief because he's his fall name is fire Chief. You
live behind the fire station in the fire pond. So that's how he got
that name. He's a great he's a great animal. He's one of the
most gentle animals I've ever met, not just because he's a snapping turtle.
He's gentle, he's he's a gentle animal. Yeah, people don't know how
they're all different snapping turtle and that's maybe something we should talk about. Dude.
You can pick up a snapping turtle very easily without being hurt. You
just need to know how to do it. Yep. Yeah, from the
side can demonstrate. Yeah, you'd never grab him by the tail because that
actually hurts him. The turtles ribs in its spine are all fused inside the
shell. They're all fused as part of the turtle, so he can't come
out of the shell. And the best way to pick up a snapping turtle
is called the wheelwell grip, and behind the back legs is kind of like
a hollow space. So if you grab the top of the shell the carapist
behind the back legs on top of it, you can get a firm grip
and hold him out and he can't he can't reach you, he can't bite
you, and you can safely move him in the direction he or she was
going. Yeah, and it's always to be holding a turtle like that.
It's like holding a historic you know, it's like a hole in a dinosaur.
It's really like having a friend who's a dinosaur. Didn't you always growing
absolutely one? Now. One of the turtles that we have in our forest
in South Charlotte is the fact that these things can go. I mean,
he could be fourteen to sixteen inches wide. And the thing is is that
they like to walk across the street. The whole entire area will stop and
wait for that turtle to move. But what happens when it's on that hot
pavement. We've got to figure out ways to move them. What would be
the proper way with one of those large, large turtles, Well, with
a large turtle, if you're up for it, the wheelwell gripped I just
mentioned where you grab the top of the shell the characters above the back legs
hold them out. Okay, there's another one called the platter lift, where
you can slide from behind. You slide your your palm, your hand under
the turtle onto the plastrom, which is the hard plate in the bottom of
the belly. And what you do there is you slide your hand under it
and then you lift them up and you hold the back of the tail the
base of the tail, yeah, just for balance. Yeah. And if
you're if you're afraid to do that, there's a third way you can do
it. You can you can find a piece of cardboard. That's what we
hear, a car floor mat yep, that's what we did. Get him
on that, yeah, and slide him across the road, and always do
it the way he's going or she's going, because they know where they're going
there. They don't wander aimlessly. Like often it's a mother and she's going
to nesta. And they don't nest in ponds. I mean they lay eggs
on the ground yep, in sand often. So many people see a turtle
and take it back to the water. But if it's a mother trying to
lay eggs, Yeah, like making a pregnant woman hitchhiking to the hospital and
taking her back, that's no good. Well. Happy Turtle Day twenty twenty
three, you guys. I love that you've got the book. I love
that that you're sharing the journey with everybody today. And it's just because turtles
are very powerful turtlem animal to me, and I'm just so glad I got
to talk with you about turtles. Well, thank you Joy for us Happy
World Turtle Day. We're where can people go to find out more information about
you guys, because it's obvious you you have a passion and you have a
story. Here, well you can find out book the Book of Turtles wherever
books have sold, your local bookstore online. And me and side both have
our websites, um Si Montgomery dot com. All right, right, and
then my website is M. Pattison art dot com. But you can google
us and we'll pop up. I love it. Please come, please come
back to this show anytime in the future. The door is always going to
be open for you too. Gro thank you, oh, thank you.
We'll take you up on it. Please do you be brilliant today? Okay,
thank you, y brilliant